The Notre Dame Fighting Irish have added the Rice Owls to their 2026 football schedule, both schools announced Tuesday. Notre Dame will host Rice at Notre Dame Stadium in South Bend, Ind., on Saturday, Sept. 12, 2026, and the game will mark the sixth overall meeting between the two schools on the gridiron.
Notre Dame and Rice have faced each other five times in football, with Notre Dame holding a perfect 5-0 record in the series, which began in 1915. The most recent matchup occurred on August 30, 2014, when Notre Dame dominated Rice, 48-17, at Notre Dame Stadium. The series has been one-sided, with Notre Dame’s largest margin of victory coming in 1915, a 55-2 rout.
Notre Dame, who plays as an FBS Independent, now has 11 games scheduled for the 2026 season. Other teams scheduled to visit South Bend next season include Michigan State on Sept. 19, along with Miami and SMU on dates to be determined.
Road opponents for Notre Dame in 2026 include Wisconsin on Sept. 6 (in Green Bay, Wisc.), Purdue on Sept. 26, North Carolina on Oct. 3, Navy on Oct. 31 (in Foxborough, Mass.), USC, Florida State, and Syracuse.
Notre Dame’s future games against ACC opponents, including in 2026, are subject to change.
With the addition of Notre Dame, Rice has completed its non-conference schedule in 2026. The Owls are scheduled to open the season at home against the Houston Christian Huskies on Sept. 5 and will host the Western Michigan Broncos two weeks later on Sept. 19. A road tilt against the Fresno State Bulldogs on Sept. 26 rounds out the non-league slate for the Owls.
“Playing Notre Dame is a tremendous opportunity for our program to compete against another that places academic excellence at the core of its mission, while giving our student-athletes the experience of playing at one of college football’s most hallowed venues,” Rice Vice President and Director of Athletics Tommy McClelland said. “It provides us with a chance to promote our program and university on a national stage and continue to build our brand.”
Football Schedules
Looks like Notre Dame will only have 5 true home games. Which is odd.
There is speculation that the game at FSU is off, but can’t get either school to confirm.
That makes sense with FSU having Alabama and Florida
As of November of last year the Syracuse game was on this site as a home game per https://fbschedules.com/smu-mustangs-to-play-at-notre-dame-in-2026/. Not sure what changed, if anything.
“Notre Dame, an FBS Independent, has 10 games set for its 2026 football schedule, which begins with a neutral-site contest against Wisconsin at Lambeau Field in Green Bay, Wisc., on Sept. 5. The Irish are slated to host Michigan State, Miami (FL), Syracuse, and SMU in South Bend and will travel to face Purdue, North Carolina, Navy, USC, and Florida State.”
Syracuse lists it as their home game. The ACC has been quietly changing the ND-ACC games and not issuing releases for some reason.
https://cuse.com/sports/2009/2/3/sidebar_313
RE: FSU. With Stanford, Cal and SMU now in the ACC for a full year, it seems like there should be an announcement before too much longer on the reshuffling of ND’s five-games-per-season arrangement to accommodate the new arrivals, which should mean a slightly reduced frequency versus all the other opponents bar Clemson, given the recent announcement..
Reports also vary on whether that USC game is firm for ‘26. If memory serves, the general belief is that this season’s game is the last on the current contract.
I am pulling for Notre Dame-USC rivalry to continue & I really want them to play third Saturday of October in both South Bend & yes L.A. plus Big Ten to play all conference games on Thanksgiving weekend which makes lots & lots of sense.
Don’t over do it Notre Dame. They have about an easy trip to the playoffs as anyone with the easy 5 game ACC deal, no conference championship game to deal with. If the USC series ends after this year like reported here earlier they will make it even easier, maybe they can replace them with army or MAC team
Easy? Tell me another college team that plays 12 regular season FBS games. Can’t tell if you are an Illinois fan or a Seminoles fan. Either way, your teams schedule doesn’t compare to the Irish.
If you want to know what NW-IL-MI stands for Dan.
NW-Northwestern Wildcats
IL-Illinois Fighting Illini
MI-Michigan Wolverines
Those are Dan’s three Big Ten Teams that I follow.
Have a safe & happy Fourth of July.
Hey, Illinoles97, how did 52-3 look last season. Did you enjoy getting buggered?
You were supposed to be the toughest game on that ND home schedule. In scheduling the game, how is Notre Dame supposed to know that Mike + the Mercenaries wouldn’t score more than two TDs against an FBS opponent all season?
ND played a minor league team in 2023 Tennessee St. ND takes the easiest path they can find.
Tennessee State as a “minor league team” is a strange criticism from you, Illininoles97.
That’s the only FCS opponent ND has ever played, and it did so on a “short week” factoring in a game in Dublin the previous Saturday night followed by Sunday travel home.
In contrast, from 2008-27, FSU will be playing 22 FCS opponents in 20 seasons, including at least one in every single season and plenty who were clearly weaker than TSU in ‘23.
And don’t get me started on Illinois. Didn’t your Illini require overtime last season to beat Purdue, the same Purdue that went winless in the B1G and succumbed 66-7 in West Lafayette against the Irish?
“Notre Dame’s future games against ACC opponents, including in 2026, are subject to change.”
That sounds like a threat from Notre Dame. They have been demanding that all of their games against Clemson count toward their 5-game ACC quota, and the ACC hasn’t yet agreed to that. ND seems to be saying that if they are scheduled to play 5 ACC teams in addition to Clemson in any given season, ND will just cancel whichever one of those games they want to cancel.
I think subject to change because three new schools are now in the ACC and will seemingly be weaved into the arrangement.
I would like Notre Dame to end 2026 at ACC opponent & at USC 10/17/26 so rivalry can be renew & play on third Saturday in October every year.
Those are my words, not from Notre Dame. The ACC has been fiddling with ND’s opponents for years and will continue to do so.
I continue to support Notre Dame/ACC alliance even with fiddling going on.
This is pretty silly and sad. I am not a Notre Dame fan, but I went all the way back to 1995 on their past schedules and I don’t see where they played an FCS/I-AA team, but I believe that the Tennessee State game was a filler for a game that was cancelled very late and so they brough Eddie George and his team in for that one game.
It’s interesting on here that all the people that criticize Notre Dame fail to say who their team is, but if you look at the most of the P4 teams, it is rare them play a P4 in OOC games. Looking just at ND’s future scheduled games, I don’t see where ND plays more than 2 games against opponents outside P4, and in 2025, those two are Navy and Boise State. Most P4 won’t even want to play Boise State and then have the audacity to claim they don’t play a worthy schedule, but in Notre Dame’s case, I don’t care who the 10 P4 teams are, there aren’t many teams that are willing to play these games. Yet, you say they are weak for scheduling them.
I don’t fully understand the difficulties in putting a college football schedule together, but maybe if any of us did there would be better appreciation for what any team goes through to put together schedules. I am sure this has a lot to do with why they schedule games so far in advance.
Remember too, conference championship games are not required by the NCAA. If the conferences didn’t feel the need to add so many teams and just played every team in the conference, there would be no need conference championship games at all. They devalue the regular season, but they also line a lot of pockets belonging to people who probably don’t really care that much about football or the kids on the field risking injury.
I am a fan of FCS, specifically, Montana, by the way. I am also a Sam Houston State grad, but the FCS is by no means a ‘minor league’ and I would dare say that the same teams that run for the door when Boise State is mentioned would do likewise for many FCS games.
This is just a suggestion I would like to see Notre Dame at North Carolina play on Thanksgiving weekend along with Duke at North Carolina State & Wake Forest at Southern Methodist to conclude 2026 season.